


Your Friends Hold the Lullabies

by paperwar



Category: Natsume Yuujinchou
Genre: Gen, Time Travel
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-06-04
Updated: 2011-06-04
Packaged: 2017-10-21 05:12:36
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 833
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/221300
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/paperwar/pseuds/paperwar
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Written for the <a href="http://natsumeyuujinchou.dreamwidth.org/7316.html">Natsume Yuujinchou comment meme</a>.</p><p>Prompt: "Taki, Tanuma, and ten-year-old Natsume, gen. I don't really care how you do it (time travel, Natsume getting trapped in his memories again and Nyanko-sensei or someone sending the other two after him, etc.); I just want the two of them giving Natsume's younger self a big hug."</p>
            </blockquote>





	Your Friends Hold the Lullabies

**Author's Note:**

> Title from Stars' song "Look Up."

The boy stares at them, and the skittishness on his face -- the conviction that the two teenagers in front of him are going to hurt him -- still has an echo in the Natsume they know. But here is the root, here is the wellspring of his pain, and Taki knows Tanuma's struggling not to weep just as much as she is.

"I promise," Taki says, squatting in front of ten-year-old Natsume.

"Things... change," Tanuma says, voice rough. "For the better," he adds quickly.

This young Natsume, whose hurt is so ever-present, who has no reason to believe them at all, at all, just keeps staring. His shirt is torn; there's a crudely mended spot on his sleeve that indicates that whatever, or whoever, ripped his clothing probably had done so before. "That's in the future," he says. "Right?"

"Yes, yes," Taki says, fiercely, and then she leans back a little, wary of making him run off. "Look," she adds, and takes a deep breath, "we'll -- "

Tanuma puts up a hand, giving her a look of caution. "Natsume," he tells the boy, kneeling down in his turn, "in just a few years there'll be people you'll know, who'll" -- his voice breaks a little again -- "treat you better than this."

Natsume's lip quivers. There's no reason he should trust them, they know. But he wants to. And that, again, is so much like their Natsume: that desperate, persistent belief in people, in the sturdiness of hearts and in human (or not) connection. This Natsume may be almost broken, but the seed, the bright glowing heart of him, is still there.

Taki puts a careful hand on Natsume's shoulder. He tenses under her fingers and she holds her breath. Then she's hit with a sudden wave of dizziness. She looks over at Tanuma, whose face has gone slightly off-color, and he nods.

They don't have much time left.

"Natsume," she says, and gives in, drawing him into her arms. "It'll be okay. I promise. Just... hold on, okay?" Her eyes are squeezed shut, so her sense of the moment is of the startled intake of breath from Natsume, the way his heart's pounding in his chest, the way he's torn between breaking away and burrowing in as close as he can. She hears a scrape of shoe on asphalt and then Tanuma's arms go around Natsume from the other side, his arms and hers forming a protective circle.

Again, that wave of dizziness, and Taki wants to cry. "We... we don't have very much longer," she says into Natsume's hair.

He stiffens. "So... you're leaving?" He squirms free. His face is stricken and his lip quivering. He tightens his lips, but the tears in his eyes catch the light.

"We can't help it, Natsume," Tanuma says. "We're not... from around here."

Natsume glowers at them. "Are you... are you youkai?"

They shake their heads vigorously; Taki hopes he can still see them. They're fading, they can tell. The whirling sensation, the dizziness that presaged their transit through time, is increasing; it's a drone in their ears, it's undeniable.

"We're your friends, Natsume!" Taki yells. She can make out, through the spots across her vision, that he winces; maybe she was too loud, maybe only she and Tanuma can hear that sound.

"Wait for us," Tanuma says in a more normal tone of voice, and she hopes, so hard she almost forgets to breathe, that Natsume hears them. That he believes. That he'll remember.

Then blackness, a wrenching in the stomach, and they're back in their own time. Nyanko-sensei is smirking over them as they sprawl awkwardly on the floor of Natsume's bedroom, panting. Taki's working very hard on not vomiting, and from the looks of Tanuma, she's not the only one.

"You found him," the cat says. It's not a question; after all, Natsume -- their Natsume, present-day Natsume -- is lying on the floor next to them. He's breathing a little easier; he looks somehow more alive than he did earlier, when Nyanko-sensei waylaid them on their way home from school, something he'd never done before.

"Did... did it work?" Taki asks uncertainly, pushing herself into a sitting position. She swallows twice, hard, and takes a deep breath. "I feel terrible," she adds unnecessarily. "That was a hard ride." She looks over at Natsume. "But did it work?"

Tanuma's stretching his neck, gently, and yawning in an exaggerated fashion, like someone on a plane trying to make his ears pop.

He and Nyanko-sensei turn towards Natsume, who stirs under their combined regard. Natsume blinks, rubs his eyes, and sits up, frowning. "Taki. Tanuma." Turning to Nyanko-sensei, he says, "You... brought them."

Nyanko-sensei looks smug. "Of course, dummy. You're too weak to come back by yourself. Lucky these two are dumb enough to go after you."

Natsume's head rocks back a little. "Was it dangerous?" He turns to Taki and Tanuma. "You shouldn't have -- "

In unison, they shake their heads. "Natsume," Tanuma says. "Of course we should have."


End file.
